Listening
by nhsweetcherry
Summary: John's perspective as he's stuck up on Five during rescues, listening in on his brothers.
1. Chapter 1

_This may become a series…_

 _I do not own the Thunderbirds, and I am making no profit from this story._

"Scott!"

Virgil's cry echoes hollowly through my comm. system, and I unconsciously lean forward, my shoulders tensing and my gloved hands squeezing into fists, waiting for the reply.

Virgil tries again. "Scott, come in!"

Gordon breaks in, speaking between coughs. "What happened, Virg? He wasn't in the building when it collapsed, was he?"

"I don't know," Virgil replies tensely. "Scott, do you read me?"

The silence from our older brother is long – too long. My heart rate begins to pick up, and I whirl toward the panel that displays my brothers' vital signs and suit statistics, looking for clues that might indicate whether Scott has been injured.

Just then, though, there's a crackling sound, and Scott's voice comes over the radio. "Hey, guys, can you hear me now?"

"Scott!" Virgil says, his tone relieved. "What happened? You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine – my comm. system just glitched out for some reason. I could hear you, but apparently you couldn't hear me. I'll have to have Brains take a look at it when we get home."

The conversation transitions back into the normal rescue chatter then, and I float backward with a soft sigh of relief, letting the words drift past me without paying much attention – I know what to listen for.

For a little while, I'm busy monitoring the airwaves and keeping half an eye on the map of the danger zone, watching for any signs of an aftershock.

"Hey, Johnny, you there?" Gordon suddenly asks.

 _Well, it's not like I have anywhere else to go._ "Yeah, Gords, what's up?"

"I don't think this guy knows any English. Can you translate for me? I'm trying to get him to follow me to the safety checkpoint."

I sigh. That's me – the Orbiting Translator, on call 24/7. "Sure." I speak to the man, trying a Mandarin greeting first; most of the people in the area are likely to know that, although some probably speak a dialect.

Sure enough, I'm rewarded with an excited reply, and I take a minute to calm the man down before I tell him to follow Gordon.

That throws him into a panic, and it takes a few minutes to unravel the issue – namely, that he doesn't want to leave the scene because he's concerned that his wife will come looking for him, and he has lost his cell phone, so he can't call her and tell her where he's going.

I ask him for his wife's phone number and patch the phone call through Gordon's comm. system. The man gives a little cry of joy as he hears his wife's voice.

I smirk a little as I listen, wondering what Gordon thinks of the storm of Chinese rattling through his speaker. Too bad I can't see his face…or wait, can I? He's near a store…and yes, it has a security camera! I tap in to the camera's feed and grin as the scene pops up onto my screen.

There's Gordon, subtly leaning backward, his face frozen somewhere between polite and really, really alarmed as the Chinese man speaks rapidly, his mouth a few inches away from the IR symbol on Gordon's chest.

But then the camera seems to vibrate slightly, and I stop smiling. A second later, an alert sounds, and I spin around to look at the topographic map of the scene. My suspicions confirmed, I quickly push the button that will contact all of my brothers.

"International Rescue, we have an aftershock coming," I announce. "Get to a safe location _immediately_!"

And my last glimpse of Gordon is him grabbing the Chinese man by the scruff of the neck and pulling him out into the middle of the street, away from buildings that might collapse on them. Then the camera cuts out and I'm blind again.

Fifteen long seconds later, the aftershock is over, and there's another flurry of activity over the comms as Scott checks in with Virgil and Gordon. Both of them report in quickly, and I breathe yet another sigh of relief.

That is, until I pick up on a soft, muttered "Ouch" from Virgil.

Scott hears it too. "Virg? What's wrong?" he demands.

"Oh, nothing," Virgil replies quickly. "I'm fine, totally fine! Nothing wrong here!"

I glance at the medical screen and roll my eyes. "Scott, he's lying. Virgil's suit sensors are showing that he received a significant blow to his right shoulder. And based on the way his pulse and breathing are picking up, I'd guess that it was something sharp and that he's losing blood."

"Virg?" Scott repeats.

There's a long pause, then Virgil mutters darkly, "Tattletale." He huffs in annoyance. " _Fine_ …I'll stop by Two and do a quick patch."

"Take a break and hydrate while you're at it," Scott tells him. "You were about due for a break anyway."

Virgil just growls in response.

I smirk – Virgil seems to think he's got the corner in the market when it comes to catching brothers hiding injuries, so it's always entertaining to catch him doing the same thing.

Scott's hologram pops up in front of me; he's in the Mole now, tunneling under a building to get at people trapped in the basement. "Keep an eye on Virg for me, will you?" he asks. "I'll be down here for a little while."

"FAB, Scott," I reply.

We share a glance and then laugh as we realize we're wearing the same expression – Gordon would call it the Smother Hen face. It's nice to be able to see Scott. I can't always get a visual on a rescue scene, and it can feel very restrictive to try to figure out what's going on based solely on what people are saying over the comms.

The rest of the rescue goes smoothly; we successfully evacuate several dozen people from the scene of the earthquake.

Gordon corners Virgil and checks on his shoulder, announcing – with perhaps a bit too much glee – that the wound will require stitches and that Virgil should probably allow his copilot to fly Two home.

That suggestion is met with the expected response, and I listen with amusement to five minutes of Gordon's wheeling and Virgil's growls. Scott finally steps in and tells Virgil to go ahead and fly, but to swallow his pride and turn the controls over to Gordon if the shoulder should start to give him any trouble.

"Hmph!" Gordon says. "What's the point of having a copilot if he's never allowed to _fly_?"

"Gordon, every time I _have_ let you fly her, you've grouched about how _huge_ she is, and how terribly she handles, so I honestly have no idea why you keep on asking to fly her."

"It's the principle of the thing," Gordon mutters.

I shake my head and turn the volume of the conversation down, heading to my tiny kitchen area for a mug of hot tea – I need to unwind. This had been fairly tame as far as rescues go, but still, the constant ebb and flow of adrenaline gets to me after a while.

I think it would help if I could _be_ there, instead of just listening in, getting bits and pieces of conversations. But my role right now is to be the listener. I'm the one who hears the cries for help, the despair in my brothers' voices when something goes wrong, the joy when things go right, the emptiness on the line when someone drops out of communication…I hear it all.

Some days I love it. Some days I hate it.

But here I am, always listening.


	2. Chapter 2

In Thunderbird Five, I have the whole world at my fingertips.

Give me any set of coordinates, and in seconds, I can tell you practically anything you want to know about the place – I can tap into news cameras and security cameras or, failing that, satellite feeds.

I have road maps, topographical maps, three-dimensional mining maps, trail guides, blueprints of buildings, photos, and thousands of other publically filed records concerning vast swaths of the globe.

Using the resources available on Five, I can tell my brothers the mineral composition of a mountain they need to drill into and plot a course for the Mole that will minimize damage to the rock strata.

With just a couple taps and swipes, I can tell them precisely how long it will take them to get somewhere – and suggest a landing site that can take the weight of their ships.

Actually, if it came down to it, I could fly their ships there myself. Don't tell Scott and Virg I said this, but I like to think that I fly their Birds from Five with nearly as much finesse as they do from their pilots' seats.

I can link up my brothers' comm. systems with those of nearly anyone else in the whole world – and with Five's advanced translation programs, foreign languages are no barrier.

But every once in a while, all of Thunderbird Five's technology is simply not enough, and it never fails to impact the way our team functions.

Today is one of those days.

"Scott, I'm sorry…I just can't get a reading on him," I say.

The harshness of Scott's sigh makes my speakers crackle. "Well, have you tried the–"

I interrupt him, because we've said all of this already. "I've tried _everything_ , Scott. You're not listening to me! I _told_ you that you were likely to lose contact with Virgil due to the high percentage of–"

"John, it's been two hours!" Scott snaps.

"Yes, which is only a half hour longer than he told us he thought he'd be gone. How often have _you_ managed to get in and out of a rescue within the exact time frame you had specified? Shall I look it up?"

"Go ahead," Scott jibed. "Sounds like that's about the only thing your hunk of junk is good for!"

That stings. "Scott…" I say, then pause and take a deep breath, pinching the bridge of my nose. I feel a headache coming on.

"Sorry," he mutters. "I didn't mean that."

I roll my shoulders, trying to let go of some of the tension. "It's okay."

Itching for something – _anything_ – to do, I start up the scans again, searching for even the tiniest blip that would indicate Virgil's location deep underground. My actions run counter to all that I had just said to Scott, but he and I are set up for voice-only, so he won't be able to see what I'm doing, anyway.

There's a long pause, and then Scott mutters sullenly, "I still think I ought to go down after him."

And…my shoulders tense right back up again. I have to work to keep from clenching my jaw, because I know that will only exacerbate my rapidly growing headache. "We already discussed _that_ too, Scott. There are way too many flaws with that plan – for example, Virgil dug an almost-vertical hole, so you'd be using your grapple packs, right? Well, what if Virgil was coming up as you were going down, and he couldn't stop the Mole in time?"

"John!" Scott yelps. "Good grief – is that the kind of thing you think about in your spare time? That's morbid!"

"I have to think about things like that, Scott. It's a part of my job." A quiet beep sounds as the scans finish running. I glance at the screen, and I'm not surprised to see that the results are negative. Still, there's a disappointed little _thud_ deep inside my chest.

I put my microphone on mute, letting Scott blather on about my pessimism. Hey, he can say whatever he wants, as long as talking keeps him out of that accursed hole.

I ping the Mole. "Mole from Thunderbird Five, come in please, Virgil."

The radio remains silent, and I let out a long sigh, glancing at the time. Okay, so sending Scott down the hole with grapple packs is out of the question, but I wonder if there are enough parts left in Thunderbird Two to build something else that can successfully traverse the steep, narrow passageway. Maybe I'll call Brains and ask him…

I almost miss the crackling sound on my radio the first time. But then it happens again, and I quickly reach over and swipe Scott's volume to zero so I can hear better.

There it is again – a harsh crackle, louder this time, and accompanied by a garbled sound that might be a human voice. My sensors can't even tell me for sure yet what it is, but it's accompanied by a tentative flicker of light in the frequency range normally occupied by the Mole.

I grab my mike. "This is Thunderbird Five," I say. "Please repeat."

There's more white noise, then Virgil's deep voice fills my ship, interrupted by frequent bursts of static. "Yeah, this is – Mole. I have – victims and I – my way to the surface."

"That's good news, Virgil," I say. "We'll see you soon."

I let out a long sigh, the relief washing over me and making me float limp in the gentle embrace of my ship's low gravity. I quickly snap out of it, though, as I remember that I need to update Scott.

My hands fly to the controls and bump the volume back up on my connection with Scott.

His words burst against me in an excited torrent, making me flinch.

"John!" he's saying. "I can feel the vibrations of the Mole coming back up! John? Hey, Johnny! Are you even listening to me?"

"I'm here, Scott," I say. "I just had radio contact with Virgil. It was a pretty bad connection, but it sounds like he's successfully extracted the victims."

Scott lets out another speaker-crackling sigh, but this one has a different feel to it than the one from a few minutes earlier. "That's great, John," he says, more calm now. "Thanks! And…uh, thanks for not letting me go down after him."

I smile. "No problem." After all that's one of the main reasons I'm up here – to listen to my brothers and to watch out for them.


	3. Chapter 3

Any day that I have to send my brothers in three different directions is not exactly my idea of a good day – and not just because it's three times the amount of work on my end.

I'm very good at multitasking – actually, scratch that…I'm _phenomenal_ at multitasking. It's my whole job, and I love it. I know Thunderbird Five's systems inside and out, and simultaneous rescues allow me to utilize her amazing capabilities to the fullest. I can pull up any data my brothers ask me for in seconds, my fingers dancing across the holographic screens, my mind racing to keep up with the different threads of conversation.

To be honest, I thrive under the pressure.

So it's not the mental and physical challenges that I dislike.

It's the fact that with three brothers at separate rescues, things are three times as likely to go wrong, and I can't send them in to back each other up the way I normally would.

There have been times that Virgil really shouldn't have flown Two home, but he had no choice, because his copilot was halfway around the world and a couple thousand feet below the surface of the water.

Other times, Gordon has really needed the power of Two's magnetic cables to supplement Four's grasping arms, and he's had to either wait a long time or come up with some other creative solution.

And then there's Scott, always going off on his crazy, impulsive little ventures. If I had my way, he'd never go to _any_ rescue without backup, but unfortunately, that is a wish that International Rescue simply cannot cater to. I just have to keep on trusting that the idiot won't get himself killed.

Today, Virgil's in Switzerland, Gordon's in the Marshall Islands, and Scott's in trouble.

It always starts out sounding so innocent.

"Hey, I'm just gonna check out this one other building," he'll say. This is what he told me a few minutes ago, in fact.

He'll be quiet for a little while, and then, all of a sudden, all I'll hear from his comm. line is yelling. Today it seems to involve gangsters – oh, wait, no, that's "banisters."

He's either telling me that he's found the world's best stair railing to slide down, or that the banister has broken, and he's fallen off the stairs.

Based on the groaning, I'd guess it's the latter.

"Thunderbird One? Scott, come in. Are you all right?"

Gordon interrupts at that moment, unintentionally drowning out Scott's answer. "Yo, Johnny, you got a sec?"

"No, as a matter of fact," I snap. But, unfortunately, he's on a rescue too, so I can't tune him out completely. "What do you need?"

"Just an updated seismic scan. Uh, pretty please?"

"Here you go," I say, shoving the data toward the blip on the screen that represents Thunderbird Four.

"Thanks!" he says cheerily.

I don't bother to reply. "Thunderbird One, do you read me?"

"I'm here," Scott mutters. "I'm just not so sure where 'here' is…can you do a scan of my location and tell me if I've fallen through into the basement?"

My fingers are in the process of obeying when Virgil's voice, crisp and urgent, booms over the line. "Thunderbird Five, I need a replay of the satellite feed for this avalanche, ASAP," he says.

"On it," I reply.

That one takes a bit longer to pull up, but in less than a minute, I'm sending the data Virgil's way. "All yours, Thunderbird Two," I tell him.

"Thanks, Thunderbird Five," he says.

I jump back onto Scott's frequency. "Sorry, Scott, I'm back now. And yes, the scans do confirm that you're in the basement. What floor did you start out on? Are you hurt?"

Scott doesn't reply, and my pulse speeds up ever so slightly. "Scott? Thunderbird One, come in, please." In the span of half a second, my brain flips through a few of the multitude of possible reasons for his silence – he's crushed under debris. He's impaled on debris. Every bone in his body is broken from the ten-story fall.

Oh, wait…I do a quick double check of my scans.

The building's only two stories tall.

Well.

Anyway.

That's still a bad fall.

"Scott, do you read me?"

"Thunderbird One here," he says calmly. "Sorry, John, I was just talking with the apartment manager here, making sure everyone's out of the building."

I lean back with a sigh. Of course that's what he's doing. _Everyone_ pauses for a bit of conversation after a two-story fall.

I watch Scott's blip on my screen move as he escorts the manager to safety.

My heart rate is almost back to normal when Gordon's voice suddenly explodes in my speakers. "Thunderbird Five, I'm gonna need some backup out here," he says. "Can you put me in touch with the GDF?"

"I can do better than that," I say. "Scott's done at his rescue. I'll send him over."

"FAB," Gordon says.

"Thunderbird One, I've got another job for you."

"Great!" Scott replies enthusiastically. "Where to?"

I plug in the coordinates and watch my screens as the sleek rocket plane begins its round-the-world trek. I sigh. Well, at least Scott and Gordon can back each other up now.

An alert dings, and I grimace as I glance at the symbol on my screen.

So much for keeping my brothers close together.

I ping Tracy Island, and my hologram appears over the coffee table just in time for me to see Alan jumping into his seat and bending studiously over his homework, pretending as though he's been working.

"International Rescue," I say. "We have a situation."

Alan's face lights up, and I can't help but smile in return.


	4. Chapter 4

Sometimes I feel like Thunderbird Five should be renamed "The Orbiting Headquarters for the Official Thunderbirds Babysitter." This is usually after my day has been filled with conversations like this:

"Scott, don't you dare – _Scott_! What did I just tell you? I want you to wait for – Scott? Scott!"

"This is your own fault, Virgil. If you had just _listened_ to me when I told you to refill your snack stash yesterday – and the day before – and the day before _that_ – then you wouldn't be 'starving' right now."

"Gordon, stop picking on your brothers. I mean it! Don't make me call Grandma!"

"Alan, please stop flying circles around my space station. Alan, I'm _warning_ you…all right, you know what? That's it! If you're still doing that by the time I count to _three_ , you're losing all rocket privileges for a month! One…two…"

I have to listen to every word they say, but sometimes I feel like they don't bother to return the favor.

Today, Gordon's my particular troublemaker. It seems like my every order is met with an obstinate reply – except for the times when he doesn't answer me at all.

He's rescuing multiple passengers from an unusually large, privately owned submarine that has gone down in the Mediterranean Sea. Virgil dropped him off there on the way to another rescue, so using Two to raise the entire sub isn't an option; Gordon has to ferry each load of people all the way to a large GDF vessel that's sitting five miles out. And since he can only carry three passengers at a time, it's proving to be a very long, very tedious rescue.

All the more so because he won't _listen_ to me.

"Thunderbird Four, come in."

There's a long pause, and Gordon sounds distracted when he answers. "Thunderbird Four. Go ahead, John."

"Gordon, that submarine's only got an hour of air left, and you're averaging one trip every fifteen minutes. You're going to have to step up the pace a little bit if you want to get everyone out of there in time."

"Well, thanks, John," Gordon says, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "I didn't know that! Maybe I'd be a little faster if you weren't calling to breathe down my neck every five minutes!"

I sit back, startled. It's unusual for Gordon to be so openly angry. "Keep it professional, Thunderbird Four," I say sternly. "Just remember – lives are at stake."

"FAB," he growls, cutting the connection.

The next few minutes, I'm busy monitoring Scott and Virgil's rescues, but the conversation with Gordon sits in the back of my mind, nagging at me. Why is he so angry?

When my radio finally quiets down for a minute, I think back through my interactions with Gordon, trying to figure out if I've said anything different than normal that would have irritated him. Nothing comes to mind, other than our final bit of conversation. I mean, most of my calls have been warning him about different things – such as advising him to watch out for some particularly turbulent currents in his area, and letting him know that a bit of a storm was approaching on the surface…the usual stuff. He was cheerful when Virgil dropped him off, but ever since he first boarded the other sub, he's been growing increasingly snappy.

My curiosity is piqued now – what's got my normally cheerful, laid-back brother so worked up?

I hesitate, then tap into the damaged submarine's internal security cameras – she's on emergency power, but most of her electrical systems are apparently still online. I flick through various cameras until I find the one that's pointing toward the airlock.

There's Gordon, along with…let's see…one, two, three, four, five, _six_ passengers still remaining. I glance at the clock, and my finger twitches toward the comm. switch – Gordon's cutting it awfully close.

One of the passengers speaks up then, an unpleasant, leering smile on his face. "'Bout time for your boss to call and check up on you again, eh, kid? Wonder what you've done wrong _this_ time?" He elbows Gordon exaggeratedly, then sways and nearly falls over.

I realize with a jolt, as I look over the other passengers, that Gordon is dealing with a boatload of _drunks_.

Aha. That could explain the snappishness, all right. I wince, feeling a little twinge of guilt that all of my calls so far could have been interpreted negatively – in fact, the passengers have evidently been using my words to cast a slur on Gordon's abilities. For all of his big talk, Gordon's actually a pretty humble guy at heart, but if there's one thing he takes pride in, it's his expertise as an aquanaut. To have my words twisted into insults would be a real slap in the face.

Well. I know how to fix _that._

"Thunderbird Four, come in please."

Watching the video feed, I see Gordon's shoulders tense slightly. Raucous laughter sounds from behind him.

"Ooh, you're in for it now, kiddie – the big man himself is calling again to tell you to stop toddling along!"

"Go ahead, Thunderbird Five," Gordon says from between gritted teeth.

"Sir," I say, and watch Gordon's eyebrows shoot up to his hairline. "Sorry to bother you, sir, but if it's not too much trouble, the press wants an interview with you after you're done rescuing these people. They're calling this the rescue of the century, and they want to know if you'd rather they used the headline 'World's Foremost Aquanaut Saves Dozens from Stranded Submarine' or 'Move Aside, Aquaman – We've Got a New Hero in the Sea.'"

And now Gordon is doing his dead level best to hide a grin as the people behind him begin to ooh and ah.

I see Gordon searching for the camera, and when he spots it, he mouths, "Thank you." Then he clears his throat and says, "Well, I don't know, Thunderbird Five. That seems a little strong." He turns to the passengers. "What do you think?"

The primary loudmouth stares at Gordon wide-eyed. "You're Aquaman…and you didn't tell us?" He holds his arms spread wide. "C'mere and gimme a hug, buddy!"

Gordon quickly steps out of his reach. "Uh, maybe later – right now I've got to get all of you _fine_ people to safety." He begins herding the next-to-last group of passengers toward the airlock, checking their scuba equipment as he walks.

The loudmouth watches him go, muttering, "Man, I gotta tell my kids about this! Real honor, sir, real honor…"

The rest of the rescue goes off without a hitch. The only thing Gordon has to watch out for now is overly long handshakes and the toxic breath of the people trying to hug him.

Once he's offloaded the last of the passengers onto the GDF vessel, and he's making his way to the rendezvous point to wait for a pickup from Virgil, he calls me.

"Hey, Johnny?" he says softly. "Sorry for yelling." He grins. "And thanks for the help at the end there. I shouldn't have let those people get under my skin like that."

I shrug. "Hey, it happens to the best of us – even Aquaman, I'm sure."

He starts laughing – and then I start laughing, and we can't stop for a couple minutes. Every time one of us starts to catch our breath, the other will say, "Did you see his face?" or "Real honor, sir," and we'll be off again.

Scott calls in the middle of all that, casts one disbelieving look at me, and says, "Uh, I'll check back in a little bit."

And that sets me off again, which in turn gets Gordon going again.

Finally, the last of the laughter dies off into tired little chuckles, and we're both wiping our eyes.

Gordon takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly, one last little laugh hitching in his throat. "Thanks, Johnny," he says. "That was awesome. _You're_ awesome."

He signs off, and I go back to my routine, although I have to admit that it takes a little while to get my brain back in gear.

Once I've checked in with Scott and answered his question, I call Alan and ask a favor of him. He's a good kid – he quickly agrees to my request without asking questions, as long as I promise to tell him the story later.

So when Gordon gets home and goes to his room, there'll be a bright new poster on his wall, featuring Gordon in his IR uniform and holding a trident, with big words splashed across the top stating, "Move Aside, Aquaman – We've Got a New Hero in the Sea."

Hey, what can I say?

I'm an _awesome_ babysitter.


	5. Chapter 5

_I haven't been keeping up with TAG, so I'll just say that this is set sometime in season 1 or 2 in case there are any plot conflicts with the current TAG season._

It's been one of _those_ days, and I'm more than ready to put Thunderbird Five into night mode and try to shut my tired brain down, but I can't shake this nagging feeling that something is wrong on the island. Knowing that I won't be able to sleep until I check, I pull up the video feed from the lounge.

The first thing I observe is that Virgil is playing the piano – odd, since he had broken his arm today. Without the left-hand harmonization, the tune sounds hollow and lifeless, making a shiver run up and down my spine as the fading notes echo through the rounded passageways of Thunderbird Five.

Virgil somehow hasn't noticed the blue glow of my holographic image hovering over the coffee table; with a couple swiping motions, I toggle my view to a different camera so that I can see him more clearly.

I frown as I study him – he's slumped on the piano bench, his broad shoulders hunched forward and his eyes focused on the fingers of his right hand, which are resting on the keyboard. There's a deep furrow between his eyebrows. His left arm, ensconced in a cast, is nestled close to his chest in a sling.

He takes a deep breath and pushes it back out in a long sigh, then quirks an eyebrow at the camera. "I know you're there," he says quietly. His right-hand fingers trail down the keyboard in a series of desolate, minor-key arpeggios.

So much for him not noticing me. I nudge a button that makes my hologram pop up in front of him. Feeling a little silly at having been caught spying, I ask lamely, "How's the arm?"

He shrugs. "Fine."

"Crazy rescue today, huh?"

Virgil's shoulders tighten. "Sure was."

It's unsettling to see his expressive brown eyes dark and closed off. My mind is racing as I think back over the rescue and try to figure out what's made him build a wall around himself like this. It was a hard day for all of us, so it could be any number of things. In any case, it's going to take creativity to get through the wall – with Virgil's stubborn streak, there's no way I can just break through. I have to go over, under or around.

I decide to try "around" first. "What do you think our lives would be like right now if we'd never joined International Rescue?" I ask.

His eyebrows lift a little at the randomness of the question, but I can see the wheels start to turn. With his creative mind, he can't help himself – imagining is his forte.

"I don't know," he says slowly. "Weird. Different." He sighs. "Peaceful."

Now we're getting somewhere.

"I'm guessing we wouldn't all still be living at home," he says dryly. "Scott would probably be in the GDF. So maybe not so peaceful for him. You'd probably be heading up some deep space expedition or something. Gordon – I don't know. Something in marine biology, probably. Alan would still be in school, of course."

"And you?" I prompt.

His face darkens. "I'd be someplace where I wouldn't be making stupid mistakes that almost cost me two brothers," he growls, smashing his fist into the piano keys in an uncharacteristic outburst of temper.

I wince at the discordant clash of ebony and ivory. " _What_? Virgil, that wasn't your fault–"

"No, it was _totally_ my fault. I didn't even check to see if that floor was safe. You can't tell me that that wasn't stupid and irresponsible! I put people in danger, John – including my own family members. That building could have collapsed at any second. And then those people ended up having to wait an extra ten minutes while Scott and Gordon got me out. _I_ caused that delay! What if those people had died because of _me_?" He pushes himself roughly up from the piano bench and begins pacing.

"Virgil, you know you can't let the what-ifs get you down–"

He shoots me a look that stops me short. With an effort, I tamp down all the words waiting to spill out of my mouth, except for the four that Virgil apparently needs to hear. "Okay, Virgil…I'm listening."

He sighs and shoves his fingers through his hair. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't be taking this out on you. It's just…we've already been through so much. I'm…I'm trying so hard to just hold things together and keep everyone safe – and today I really blew it." He drops heavily back onto the piano bench. "I know that's stupid," he says, "and I know I probably only feel this way because I'm tired and on pain meds, but still…"

He trails off, and we sit in silence for a long minute. I'm not sure if he's done talking, so I keep my mouth shut, even though my mind is helpfully enumerating a list of the reasons why Virgil shouldn't feel bad about what had happened during the rescue today.

Just when I'm about to speak up again, Virgil's lips lift in a little half smile and he glances up to catch my eye.

"You're a good listener," he tells me. "Scott would've been listing off reasons I shouldn't feel bad about what happened today."

I smile and shrug.

"I guess maybe I should just go to bed," Virgil continues. "Like Grandma's always saying, things always look better in the morning." He frowns and gingerly rubs his left arm. "Just wish I could play some piano for a few minutes first. I was trying a few minutes ago, but, well, you heard how that was going."

"Yeah, it sounded a little spooky, actually," I say. I consider the discouraged slump of Virgil's shoulders for another moment before adding, "Hey, I have an idea." I turn and swipe through various programs in Thunderbird Five's database for a minute, searching for one that I know is in there, but I've never had occasion to use before. A full, holographic keyboard pops up in front of me. "How about if I play the left hand and you play the right?"

Virgil's eyebrows shoot up. "Well, I'm not sure how that'll work, since you don't play the piano…"

"Hey, you're not the only one Mom tried to teach – you're just the one that actually inherited her musical genes. I'd guess it's been at least ten years since I've touched a keyboard, though, so pick something easy, okay?"

Virgil looks skeptical at first, but then a thoughtful expression steals over his face. "Okay," he says. "We're going to improvise. Use these notes." He twists around to demonstrate with his right hand where I should be holding my left hand. "Find a pattern, or play around a bit, but stick with those notes. Once you've got the start of something, I'll fill in." He sits back, his right hand resting in his lap as he waits.

I press each one of my prescribed notes down in sequence, listening. Their deep tones are pleasant but rather aimless; remembering those years-ago piano lessons, I hear Mom's voice in my head, methodically counting to help me keep in time – " _One_ and _two_ and _three_ and _four_ and _…"_ I let the rhythm settle into my mind and then into my fingers, etching out a distinct, repetitious series of notes and chords that actually sounds almost like music.

Virgil's head is bobbing ever so slightly in time with my count, his eyes on the keyboard and a small smile curving his lips. After a minute, his hand gracefully lifts and settles over the keys, and he edges his way neatly into my pattern.

He just fills in with a few little arpeggios and echoing notes at first, but then all of a sudden, my simple little chords and Virgil's trills are a full-blown song, and he's got a huge grin on his face. Somehow, even though I'm always playing the same few notes, Virgil is able to shape the music into something with purpose and direction.

Virgil guides us through two distinct verses, then smirks and exclaims, "Okay, concentrate – keep doing what you're doing, but I'm going to switch things up!"

I laugh as Virgil starts tossing in a bunch of syncopated notes; for one glorious minute, we're playing a bouncy, jazzy little tune that has my toes involuntarily tapping.

It's too much, though. The syncopation throws me off from my counting, and we crash to a halt. By the time we give up in a tangled, undignified ending, though, Virgil is laughing so hard he's nearly falling off the piano bench.

"That was awesome!" he says. "John, you're amazing!"

"Me? I hardly did anything – you're the one who turned it into music!"

He sits back and stretches his legs out under the piano bench. He's still grinning. "You've got a phenomenal sense of timing, though. I think we could actually turn you into a decent musician if you were willing to put in some practice." He yawns.

That makes me yawn too.

Virgil laughs again. "Guess I'll get to bed now." He stands up and starts to turn away, then hesitates and looks back over his shoulder, meeting my gaze. "Thanks, John," he says simply.

"Any time," I reply wholeheartedly. "Night, Virg!"

"Good night!"


End file.
